Cannes Travel Guide - Page 2

Talk about stealing the thunder! The Tribeca and San Francisco film festivals just started, but the Cannes Film Festival just sucked up some of their oxygen by announcing its lineup. France's biggest film party doesn't start until May 13, but we already know whose autograph we're going to get based on the films' lineup. Here's who you can expect to see next month:

Quentin Tarantino will probably win the paparazzi prize since he was smart enough to cast Super World Traveler Brad Pitt in his new World War II remake-slash-homage "Inglourious Basterds," and if he was really smart he put it in his contract that Angelina Jolie has to come too. The tabloids' favorite duo was the highlight of last year's Cannes Festival, largely (as is often the case these days) because of Angelina's belly which was carrying twins.

Aside from Brangelina, "Brokeback Mountain" director Ang Lee will get Liev Schreiber and Emile Hirsch on the bus for his '60s flick "Taking Woodstock." Best Supporting Actress Penelope Cruz will be getting dolled up for her new Spanish-language movie "Broken Embraces," in which she plays -- wait for it -- an actress.

Being rich and famous doesn't exempt a person from the indignities of travel. Nor does being an international treasure hunter, apparently: Harrison Ford's red-carpet premiere for "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" at the Cannes Film Festival was ruined when someone made off with his digital camera.

Last seen in Ford's pocket, the camera has not yet been recovered and is the only medium in history to prove that, when she turns sideways, the actor's wife Calista Flockhart actually does disappear.

Maybe Shia LaBeouf's sidekick Mutt grabbed it to make his mentor a nice scrapbook!

When you're lolling on the Med in southern France it's easy to forget the rest of the world continues to have its own problems. (That's always been our excuse, anyway.) So it's pretty cool that actress Zhang Ziyi took time out from promoting her new movie "The Horsemen" (costarring Dennis Quaid) to raise awareness for the earthquake relief efforts in her native country.

Having personally donated a million yuan ($140,000) to help people who lost family members or their homes in the quake, Zhang bore a placard wishing "good fortune" to Sichuan province and encouraged other stars to step up to the plate. (Houston Rockets star Yao Ming just shot several PSAs for the Red Cross in the US and China to spur donations.)

If you would like to give to the relief efforts in China, check out nonprofit watchdog Charity Navigator's list of top-ranked charities, all of which are either working directly in the disaster zone or have well established partner agencies there.

Woody Allen's new movie "Vicky Cristina Barcelona," shot in Spain last year, got the red-carpet treatment at the Cannes Film Festival over the weekend, with star Penelope Cruz braving the flashbulbs.

But where was American beauty (and recent Allen muse) Scarlett Johansson? Rumor has it the recently engaged actress's demands caused the studio to reject her travel arrangements including an expensive make-up assistant and a posh suite at a particular hotel.

To play devil's advocate, maybe Johansson wanted to spend the week with her new fiance Ryan Reynolds. But why not take him to southern France? We hear it's very romantic! Even without her, though, the movie reportedly got a ten-minute standing ovation at a public screening.

Angelina Jolie made it to the Cannes Film Festival this week with a little extra, shall we say, carry-on luggage: The actress's co-star in the forthcoming animated film "Kung Fu Panda," Jack Black, accidentally let it slip that, as tabloids have been predicting for months now, the Jolie-Pitt clan is expecting two new family members. Doesn't she look great, though?

While Jolie and Brad Pitt have stayed mum on the pregnancy, they are expected to announce tomorrow in an interview with the Today show the due date of the newest Super World Travelers. Jolie bore her first biological child, Shiloh Nouvel, in Namibia--to which remote country will she travel for twins?

Although the world's most glamorous film festival is still a month away, we're totally jazzed about two bits of pre-Festival de Cannes news. The fourth Indiana Jones flick is set to premiere, and Russia is representin' at Cannes' International Village.

Yep, you heard it here first. Shia, Spielberg, Stoli and stroganoff all under one tent from May 14-25. Now that's a party.

We've now reached what the Hollywood Reporter inelegantly calls "halftime" for the 2007 Cannes Film Festival. Chinese director Wong Kar-Wai's first English-language film debuted, Michael Moore got a standing ovation (just not from the Treasury Department) for his new documentary, and Pamela Anderson went back on her word and posed for photographers in a skimpy string bikini. The super world travelers even showed up!

Early works were rumored to be a bit of a letdown, but new works by Gus Van Sant ("Paranoid Park," a murder mystery set at a Portland skate park) and the Coen Brothers ("No Country for Old Men," a Cormac McCarthy adaptation starring Tommy Lee Jones) among many others are still up ahead. Check out the official screening schedule, if you still want to catch a show, and then start hoping for a last-minute cancellation at one of our recommended hotels, because if Angelina Jolie doesn't adopt you you could be sleeping on the beach.

Most working actors would kill to hear their new film would have a premiere at the Cannes Film Festival. Not Pamela Anderson! The "Stacked" and "Borat" actress told People magazine she'd be having her own premiere "in my bed with popcorn," open only to her two sons. Instead, Denise Richards will be representing the stars of "Blonde and Blonder," written by Anderson's brother Gerry, at the festival.

Hey now, just because your ex didn't buy you an island after all, there's no need to stay at home and mope. Air France still has $1100 tickets to Nice (the closest commercial airport to Cannes), if you can leave before Sunday.

Longtime Jaunted readers know we have a little bit of a Borat obsession over here. The man sets travel trends at a torrid pace. Yesterday, on a beach in Cannes, he did it again, debuting what looks like some type of banana slingshot bathing suite, or maybe it is an upside down Star Trek symbol suite. Actually, come to think of it, it looks like one of those sterogram posters where if you relax your eyes and stare at it long enough, you fall into a trance and see hidden pink dolphins jumping out of the water. On second thought, if you are able to relax your eyes while staring at Borat in the above photo, seek professional help immediately.

Oh, most expensive hotel room in the world, where are you? Dubai? Paris? On the moon? Oh, wait, then it wouldn't be in the world. Anyway, according to our sister over at Hotel Chatter, it's in Cannes at the Hotel Martinez, and it will set you back $37,200 a night to stay there. And if you move anything around in the mini-bar, make sure you put it back before thirty seconds elapse: there are sensors in there that will charge you automatically.

The room is pretty tame, considering the price. There are no diamond-encrusted toilet seats or chinchilla-fur towels, just a four-bedroom penthouse suite with views of the ocean and an outdoor Jacuzzi on the balcony. Color us underwhelmed, but we expect a little entertainment with for our 37 grand. For that much scratch, we expect to watch two of the hotel's bellmen fight to the death, at least. Sigh...luxury doesn't mean what it used to anymore.